Imagism
Imagism was a movement in early-20th-century poetry that favored precision of imagery and clear, sharp language. It is considered to be the first organized modernist literary movement in the English language.[1] Imagism has been termed "a succession of creative moments" rather than a continuous or sustained period of development. The French academic René Taupin remarked that "it is more accurate to consider Imagism not as a doctrine, nor even as a poetic school, but as the association of a few poets who were for a certain time in agreement on a small number of important principles".[2]
The Imagists rejected the sentiment and discursiveness typical of
Imagist publications appearing between 1914 and 1917 featured works by many of the most prominent
Pre-Imagism
The origins of Imagism are to be found in two poems, Autumn and A City Sunset by
From the ensuing debate, Hulme and Flint became close friends. In 1909, Hulme left the Poets' Club and started meeting with Flint and other poets in a new group which Hulme referred to as the "Secession Club"; they met at the Eiffel Tower restaurant in London's
The American poet Ezra Pound was introduced to the group in April 1909 and found their ideas close to his own.
In a 1915 article in La France, French critic Remy de Gourmont described the Imagists as descendants of the French Symbolists.[15] Pound emphasised that influence in a 1928 letter to the French critic and translator René Taupin. He pointed out that Hulme was indebted to the Symbolist tradition, via W. B. Yeats, Arthur Symons and the Rhymers' Club generation of British poets and Mallarmé.[16] Taupin concluded in his 1929 study that however great the divergence of technique and language "between the image of the Imagist and the 'symbol' of the Symbolists[,] there is a difference only of precision".[2] In 1915, Pound edited the poetry of another 1890s poet, Lionel Johnson. In his introduction, he wrote
No one has written purer imagism than [Johnson] has, in the line
Clear lie the fields, and fade into blue air,
It has a beauty like the Chinese.[17]
Early publications and statements of intent
In 1911, Pound introduced two other poets to the Eiffel Tower group: his former fiancée Hilda Doolittle, who by then was writing under her initials, H.D., and H.D.'s future husband Richard Aldington. These two were interested in exploring Greek poetic models, especially Sappho, an interest that Pound shared.[18] The compression of expression that they achieved by following the Greek example complemented the proto-Imagist interest in Japanese poetry, and, in 1912, during a meeting with them in the British Museum tea room, Pound told H.D. and Aldington that they were Imagistes and even appended the signature H.D. Imagiste to some poems they were discussing.[19]
When Harriet Monroe started her Poetry magazine in 1911, she had asked Pound to act as foreign editor. In October 1912, he submitted thereto three poems each by H.D. and Aldington under the Imagiste rubric,[20] with a note describing Aldington as "one of the 'Imagistes'". This note, along with the appendix note ("The Complete Poetical Works of T. E. Hulme") in Pound's book Ripostes (1912), are considered to be the first appearances of the word "Imagiste" (later anglicised to "Imagist") in print.[20]
Aldington's poems, Choricos, To a Greek Marble, and Au Vieux Jardin, were in the November issue of Poetry, and H.D.'s, Hermes of the Ways, Priapus, and Epigram, appeared in the January 1913 issue, marking the beginning of the Imagism movement.[21] Poetry's April issue published Pound's haiku-like "In a Station of the Metro":
- The apparition of these faces in the crowd :
- Petals on a wet, black bough .[22]
The March 1913 issue of Poetry contained A Few Don'ts by an Imagiste and the essay entitled Imagisme both written by Pound,[23] with the latter attributed to Flint. The latter contained this succinct statement of the group's position, which he had agreed with H.D. and Aldington:[24]
Pound's note opened with a definition of an image as "that which presents an intellectual and emotional complex in an instant of time". Pound goes on to state,"It is better to present one Image in a lifetime than to produce voluminous works".[26] His list of "don'ts" reinforced his three statements in "Imagism", while warning that they should not be considered as dogma but as the "result of long contemplation".[27] Taken together, these two texts comprised the Imagist programme for a return to what they saw as the best poetic practice of the past. F. S. Flint commented "we have never claimed to have invented the moon. We do not pretend that our ideas are original."[28]
The 1916 preface to Some Imagist Poets comments "Imagism does not merely mean the presentation of pictures. Imagism refers to the manner of presentation, not to the subject."[29]
Des Imagistes
Determined to promote the work of the Imagists, and particularly of Aldington and H.D., Pound decided to publish an anthology under the title Des Imagistes. It was first published in Alfred Kreymborg's little magazine The Glebe and was later published in 1914 by Albert and Charles Boni in New York and by Harold Monro at the Poetry Bookshop in London. It became one of the most important and influential English-language collections of modernist verse.[30] Included in the thirty-seven poems were ten poems by Aldington, seven by H.D., and six by Pound. The book also included work by Flint, Skipwith Cannell, Amy Lowell, William Carlos Williams, James Joyce, Ford Madox Ford, Allen Upward and John Cournos.[31][32]
Pound's editorial choices were based on what he saw as the degree of sympathy that the writers displayed with Imagist precepts, rather than active participation in a group. Williams, based in the United States, had not participated in any of the discussions of the Eiffel Tower group. However, he and Pound had long been corresponding on the question of the renewal of poetry along similar lines. Ford was included at least partly because of his strong influence on Pound, as the younger poet made the transition from his earlier,
Some Imagist Poets
An article on the history of Imagism was written by Flint and published in The Egoist in May 1915. Pound disagreed with Flint's interpretation of events and the goals of the group, causing the two to cease contact with each other.
Around this time, the American Imagist Amy Lowell moved to London, determined to promote her own work and that of the other Imagist poets. Lowell was a wealthy heiress from
Lowell persuaded D. H. Lawrence to contribute poems to the 1915 and 1916 volumes,[41] making him the only writer to publish as both a Georgian poet and an Imagist. Marianne Moore also became associated with the group during this period.[42] With World War I as a backdrop, the times were not easy for avant-garde literary movements (Aldington, for example, spent much of the war at the front), and the 1917 anthology effectively marked the end of the Imagists as a movement.[43]
After Imagism
In 1929, Walter Lowenfels jokingly suggested that Aldington should produce a new Imagist anthology.[44] Aldington, by now a successful novelist, took up the suggestion and enlisted the help of Ford and H.D. The result was the Imagist Anthology 1930, edited by Aldington and including all the contributors to the four earlier anthologies with the exception of Lowell, who had died, Cannell, who had disappeared, and Pound, who declined. The appearance of this anthology initiated a critical discussion of the place of the Imagists in the history of 20th-century poetry.[45]
Of the poets who were published in the various Imagist anthologies, Joyce, Lawrence and Aldington are now primarily remembered and read as novelists. Marianne Moore, who was at most a fringe member of the group, carved out a unique poetic style of her own that retained an Imagist concern with compression of language. William Carlos Williams developed his poetic along distinctly American lines with his variable foot and a diction he claimed was taken "from the mouths of Polish mothers".[46] Both Pound and H.D. turned to long form poetry, but retained the hard edge to their language as an Imagist legacy. Most of the other members of the group are largely forgotten outside the context of Imagism.[47]
Legacy
Despite the movement's short life, Imagism would deeply influence the course of modernist poetry in English. Richard Aldington, in his 1941 memoir, writes: "I think the poems of Ezra Pound, H.D., Lawrence, and Ford Madox Ford will continue to be read. And to a considerable extent T. S. Eliot and his followers have carried on their operations from positions won by the Imagists."[48]
On the other hand, the American poet Wallace Stevens found shortcomings in the Imagist approach: "Not all objects are equal. The vice of imagism was that it did not recognize this."[49] With its demand for hardness, clarity and precision and its insistence on fidelity to appearances coupled with its rejection of irrelevant subjective emotions Imagism had later effects that are demonstratable in T. S. Eliot's Preludes and Morning at the Window and in Lawrence's animal and flower pieces. The rejection of conventional verse forms in the nineteen-twenties owed much to the Imagists' repudiation of the Georgian Poetry style.[50]
Imagism, which had made free verse a discipline and a legitimate poetic form, influenced a number of poetry circles and movements. Its influence can be seen clearly in the work of the
Among the Beats, Gary Snyder and Allen Ginsberg in particular were influenced by the Imagist emphasis on Chinese and Japanese poetry.[citation needed] Williams also had a strong effect on the Beat poets, encouraging poets like Lew Welch and writing an introduction for the book publication of Ginsberg's Howl (1955).
Citations
- ^ T.S. Eliot: "The point de repère, usually and conveniently taken as the starting-point of modern poetry, is the group denominated 'imagists' in London about 1910." Lecture, Washington University in St. Louis, June 6, 1953.
- ^ a b Taupin, René (1929). L'Influence du symbolism francais sur la poesie Americaine (de 1910 a 1920). Paris: Champion. Translation (1985) by William Pratt and Anne Rich. New York: AMS.
- ^ Davidson (1997), pp. 11–13
- ^ Brooker (1996), p. 48
- ^ McGuinness (1998), xii.
- ^ Crunden (1993), 271
- ^ Williams (2002), p. 16
- ^ Kita (2000), p. 179
- ^ Kita (2000), pp. 179–180
- ^ Ewick, David. "Strange Attractors: Ezra Pound and the Invention of Japan, II". Essays and Studies in British and American Literature, Tokyo Woman's Christian University, 2018
- ^ Kita (2000), p. 180
- ^ Moody (2007), pp. 180, 222
- ^ Cookson (1975), p. 43
- London University School of Advanced Study. March 2012.
- ^ Preface to Some Imagist Poets (1916). Constable and Company.
- JSTOR 467456.
- ^ Ming, Xie (1998), p. 80
- ^ Ayers (2004), p. 2
- ^ King; Pearson (1979), p. 18
- ^ a b Monroe, Harriet (1938). A Poet's Life. Macmillan.
- ^ "General William Booth Enters into Heaven by Vachel Lindsay". Poetry Foundation. March 20, 2018. Retrieved March 21, 2018.
- ^ DuPlessis, Rachel Blau (2001). Genders, Races, and Religious Cultures in Modern American Poetry, 1908–1934. Cambridge University Press. Excerpted in "On 'In a Station of the Metro'" (Modern American Poetry). Retrieved on August 29, 2010
- ^ Pound (1913), pp. 200–206
- ^ Geiger (1956), p. 144
- ^ Elder (1998), pp. 72, 94
- ^ Pound (1918). "A Retrospect". Reprinted in Kolocotroni et al. (1998), p. 374
- ^ Pound (1974), p. 12
- ^ F. S. Flint letter to J.C. Squire, January 29, 1917.
- ^ Some Imagist Poets (1916). Constable and Company.
- ^ Edgerly Firchow, Peter; Evelyn Scherabon Firchow; Bernfried Nugel (2002). Reluctant Modernists: Aldous Huxley and Some Contemporaries. Transaction Books, p. 32.
- ^ Thacker (2018), pp. 5–6
- ^ Pound (1914), pp. 5–6
- ^ Ellmann (1959), p. 350
- ^ Bradshaw; Munich (2002), p. xvii
- ^ Pondrom (1969), pp. 557–586
- . Retrieved July 17, 2018.
- ^ "A(bbott) Lawrence Lowell". Harvard University. Archived from the original on July 17, 2018. Retrieved July 16, 2018.
- ^ Preface to Some Imagist Poets (1915). Reprinted in Kolocotroni et al (1998), p. 268
- ^ Hughes, Glenn (1931). Imagism & The Imagists: A Study in Modern Poetry. Stanford University Press.
- ^ Moody (2007), p. 224
- ^ Lawrence (1979), p. 394
- ^ Geiger (1956), pp. 140, 145
- ^ Moody (2007), pp. 224–225
- ^ Aldington (1984), p. 103
- ^ Geiger (1956), pp. 139–147
- ^ Bercovitch; Patell (1994), p. 35
- ^ Geiger (1956), p. 139
- ISBN 978-0-8057-6691-2
- ^ Enck (1964), p. 11
- ^ Allott, Kenneth (ed.) (1950). The Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse. Penguin Books. (See introductory note.)
- ^ Sloan (1987), pp. 29–43
- ^ Stanley (1995), pp. 186–189
- ^ Olson (1966), p. 17
- ^ Riddel (1979), pp. 159–188
Sources
- Aldington, Richard; Gates, Norman (1984). Richard Aldington: An Autobiography in Letters. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press
- Aldington, Richard (1941). Life For Life's Sake. New York: Viking Press
- Ayers, David (2004). H. D., Ezra Pound and Imagism, in Modernism: A Short Introduction. Blackwell Publishers. ISBN 978-1-4051-0854-6
- ISBN 0-7108-0548-9
- ISBN 978-0-521-49733-6
- Bradshaw, Melissa; Munich, Adrienne (2002). Selected Poems of Amy Lowell. New Brunswick NJ: Rutgers University Press. ISBN 978-0-8135-3128-1
- Brooker, Jewel Spears (1996). Mastery and Escape: T. S. Eliot and the Dialectic of Modernism. University of Massachusetts Press. ISBN 1-55849-040-X
- ISBN 978-0-395-41678-5
- ISBN 978-0-8112-0574-0
- Crunden, Robert (1993). American Salons: Encounters with European Modernism, 1885–1917. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-1950-6569-5
- ISBN 0-520-20739-4
- ISBN 0-88920-275-3
- Ellmann, Richard (1959). James Joyce. Oxford: Oxford University Press
- Enck, John (1964). Wallace Stevens: Images and Judgments. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press
- Geiger, Don (1956). "Imagism; the New Poetry Forty Years Later". Prairie Schooner, volume 30, No. 2. JSTOR 40625011
- Jones, Peter (ed.) (1972). Imagist Poetry. Penguin. ISBN 978-0-1419-1314-8
- ISBN 0-571-10668-4
- King, Michael; Pearson, Norman (1979). H. D., and Ezra Pound, End to Torment: A Memoir of Ezra Pound. New York: New Directions, 1979. ISBN 978-0-8112-0720-1
- Kita, Yoshiko (2000). "Ezra Pound and Haiku: Why Did Imagists Hardly Mention Basho?". Paideuma: Modern and Contemporary Poetry and Poetics, volume 29, No. 3. JSTOR 24726040
- Kolocotroni, Vassiliki; Goldman, Jane; Taxidou, Olga (1998). Modernism: An Anthology of Sources and Documents. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-45074-2
- Lawrence, D. H. (1979). The Letters of D. H. Lawrence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
- Martin, Wallace (1970). "The Sources of the Imagist Aesthetic". PMLA, volume 85, No. 2. JSTOR 1261393
- ISBN 1-85754-362-9(pp. xii–xiii)
- Ming, Xie (1998). Ezra Pound and the Appropriation of Chinese Poetry: Cathay, Translation, and Imagism. New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-8153-2623-6
- Moody, A. David (2007). Ezra Pound: Poet. A Portrait of the Man and His Work. I: The Young Genius 1885–1920. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-957146-8
- ISBN 978-0-8112-0335-7
- Pondrom, Cyrena (1969). "Selected Letters from H. D. to F. S. Flint: A Commentary on the Imagist Period". Contemporary Literature, volume 10, issue 4.JSTOR 1207696
- Pound, Ezra (1974) [June 1914]. "How I Began". In Grace Schulman (ed.). Ezra Pound: A Collection of Criticism. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company. ISBN 0-07-055634-2
- Pound, Ezra (1970). Pound/Joyce: The Letters of Ezra Pound to James Joyce. Edited by Forrest Read. New York: New Directions Publishing. ISBN 0-8112-0159-7
- Pound, Ezra (ed.) (1914). Des Imagistes. New York: Albert and Charles Boni.
- Pound, Ezra (March 1913). "A Few Don'ts by an Imagiste". Poetry. I(6)
- Riddel, Joseph (1979). "Decentering the Image: The 'Project' of 'American' Poetics?". Boundary 2, volume 8, issue 1. JSTOR 303146
- Sloan, De Villo (1987). "The Decline of American Postmodernism". SubStance, University of Wisconsin Press, volume 16, issue 3. JSTOR 3685195
- Stanley, Sandra (1995). "Louis Zukofsky and the Transformation of a Modern American Poetics". South Atlantic Review, volume 60. JSTOR 3200737
- Sullivan, J. P. (ed.) (1970). Ezra Pound. Penguin Critical Anthologies Series. ISBN 0-14-080033-6
- Thacker, Andrew (2018). The Imagist Poets. Tavistock: Northcote House Publishers. ISBN 978-0-7463-1002-1
- Wącior, Sławomir (2007). Explaining Imagism: The Imagist Movement in Poetry and Art. Edwin Mellen Press. ISBN 0773454276
- Williams, Louise Blakeney (2002). Modernism and the Ideology of History: Literature, Politics, and the Past. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-81499-5
External links
- Some Imagist anthologies at the Modernist Journals Project
- Bibliography of Japan in English-Language Verse
- J.T. Barbarese et al.: "On 'In a Station of the Metro'" at Modern American Poetry